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Thai livestock

Why small beef farms should weigh their cattle every month

Middlemen often price cattle by eye. What to record for each animal, how to weigh without your own scale, and how to check an offer against your numbers.

Beginner10 min read

On this page
  1. Before the season: why bother with records?
  2. Month 1: decide what to write down
  3. Months 2 to 4: weighing without your own scale
  4. Month 5: feed is where the money goes
  5. Month 6: deciding when and where to sell
  6. Paper notebook or phone app?
  7. End-of-season checklist

Picture a buyer standing at your pen. He looks at your bull for a few seconds, walks around it once, and names a price. You think the animal is worth more, but you have nothing to point to except a feeling. He has seen thousands of cattle. You have seen yours.

This is not a made-up worry. A study of 100 beef farms in Phayao province found that middlemen "approximated the weight of a live animal simply by observation", and that prices depended on the middleman's satisfaction because farmers were in a poor bargaining position (Thannithi et al., 2025).

This post follows one imaginary small farm through a season. The farm, its owner and its months are made up to keep the story simple. Every fact along the way comes from a source you can open yourself, and I won't invent any results for the farm: no "she gained X kilos and sold for Y baht". The point is the habit, not a promise.

Before the season: why bother with records?

Our farm is typical in size. In the Phayao study, beef farming was mainly small-scale, averaging about 7 cattle per farm (Thannithi et al.). A 2018 review of Thai beef production describes cow-calf farmers who commonly keep 2 to 10 cows, and says plainly that "the price of cattle depends on the breed and live weight" (Bunmee et al., 2018).

If live weight sets the price, then whoever knows the weight has the stronger hand. The Phayao study shows the difference between channels clearly:

Who buys How the weight is found Source
Middlemen (traditional market) Estimated by eye Thannithi et al.
Community enterprises (medium market) Live weight measured on scales; a dressing percentage of 50% or more of live weight is applied after slaughter Thannithi et al.
Premium cooperatives Carcass grade and meat quality Thannithi et al.

In the same study, merchant middlemen took 65% of distribution, secondary markets 25% and community enterprises 10%. So most animals went to middlemen, who usually judged the weight by eye.

Records don't force a buyer to pay more. What they do is let you check an offer against something real.

A scale turns "she looks about right" into a number you can write down and compare.
A black steer standing on a livestock scale inside a metal frame
Photo: Ian Poellet, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Month 1: decide what to write down

Our farmer buys a notebook and gives each animal its own page. What goes on it?

A good guide is the Thai Agricultural Standard for beef farms, มกษ. 6400-2555 (Good Agricultural Practice for Beef Cattle Farm), published in the Royal Gazette on 30 January 2013 (B.E. 2556) (TAS 6400-2555 full text). You don't need GAP certification to borrow its ideas. In its section on records (การบันทึกข้อมูล), the standard asks a farm to:

  • record its key farm work and each animal's history (ประวัติของสัตว์);
  • include production data, for example the animal's identity number (เลขรหัสประจำตัวสัตว์), feed, herd management, animal health, disease prevention and control, animal welfare and environmental management;
  • keep the records for at least 3 years so they can be checked.

Elsewhere, it asks for an immunisation programme such as foot-and-mouth disease vaccine or other vaccines as appropriate, plus internal and external parasite control, and an auditable record of entries to and exits from the farm (TAS 6400-2555).

The standard doesn't list "weight" by name. Weight fits naturally under production data, though, and it is the number a buyer cares about. So for each animal, our farmer writes:

  1. Identity: ear tag or number, sex, breed or cross.
  2. Birth date (or purchase date and the seller's name, if bought in).
  3. Vaccinations and treatments: date, what was given, by whom.
  4. Movements: when the animal left or came onto the farm, and where to or from.
  5. Weights: date and kilograms, every time it is weighed.

Movements matter for a legal reason too. Under section 34 of the Animal Epidemics Act B.E. 2558, anyone who takes cattle or buffalo to another province must put an animal identification mark on them and get a licence from the local veterinarian at the place of departure, each time (Animal Epidemics Act, English translation). If you already write down tags and moves, that paperwork is easier.

One line per weighing: month, ear tag, weight. Boring to write, useful to read later.

Months 2 to 4: weighing without your own scale

Most small farms don't own a cattle scale. Researchers at Kasetsart University said as much: weighing scales are an important tool, but they "are not commonly available in a small farm" (Raungprim et al., 2021, Buffalo Bulletin). So how does our farmer get numbers?

Option 1: a shared scale

If a community enterprise, cooperative or buying point near you weighs animals on a scale (the Phayao study describes community enterprises doing exactly this), ask whether you can weigh your animals there before you sell. Your district livestock office is a good place to ask who has one. Even one or two real weighings a season give you a fixed point to check everything else against.

Option 2: a heart-girth tape, checked against a scale

The heart girth is the distance around the chest just behind the front legs. Studies keep finding that it tracks live weight closely:

  • In 172 young swamp buffaloes (0 to 25 months old) at Kasetsart University's Kamphaeng Saen campus, an equation using heart girth alone estimated live weight with an average accuracy of 98.92% in the authors' test, and they concluded that a single girth measurement "can be easily obtained with a girth tape in the field" (Raungprim et al., 2021).
  • In 210 F1 Brahman crossbred cattle aged 6 to 36 months, studied by researchers from Bangladesh Agricultural University and the Bangladesh Livestock Research Institute, heart girth had the highest correlation with body weight (r = 0.96) and on its own explained about 93% of the variation (Rashid et al., 2015).

Two cautions come from the same papers. The buffalo study was on young swamp buffaloes, and the authors still called for more work on developing a girth tape for the field. The Brahman study fitted different equations for different age groups. In plain words: a tape is an estimate, and its formula was made for certain animals. It works best for following one animal's change over time, and it's worth checking against a real scale when you get the chance.

An old wooden livestock scale with weights on its platform, in a farm museum
Photo: Nemracc, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Whatever you use, use the same method, at about the same time of day, each month. Consistency makes the numbers comparable.

Month 5: feed is where the money goes

Now our farmer has three or four weighings per animal. Why does that matter in month 5? Because feed is expensive, and weights are how you see whether it is paying off.

  • The 2018 review says that in Thai cattle finishing systems, concentrate feed "accounts for between 60% to 80% of production costs", depending on season, farm location and how intensive the farm is (Bunmee et al., 2018).
  • The Phayao paper says feed has the highest cost on beef farms, at over 70% of variable costs, and advises understanding the animals' needs at each stage and avoiding overfeeding (Thannithi et al.).

Read the table, not just the headline. In the Phayao farms' own cost table, the biggest single cost in all three groups was buying the cattle. Forage plus concentrate came to about 4.7% of total cost for traditional-market farms, 14.9% for medium-market farms and 23.8% for premium farms (my sums of the paper's Table 3). Feed's share grows as farms feed more concentrate. Your own numbers depend on how you feed.

That is why a monthly weight is so useful. If you change the feed in month 5 (say you add concentrate, or switch the grass), the next two weighings tell you whether the animal grew faster, the same, or slower. Without weights, you're guessing whether the extra money did anything.

When the dots stop climbing, growth has slowed: time to check the feed or think about selling.

Month 6: deciding when and where to sell

By month 6 each page holds a short line of weights. Our farmer looks for two things.

Is the line still rising? A line that climbs and then flattens tells you the animal is gaining less each month. Each extra month on feed still costs money. Only you can decide when that trade stops being worth it, but now you can see it.

Which buyer fits this animal? The Phayao study describes what each segment wanted:

  • Traditional market: Thai native, Brahman and Brahman-cross cattle, fattened 8 to 12 months to 350 to 400 kg, sold mainly to middlemen by sight.
  • Medium market: crossbred bulls with 50% or more improved-breed blood, under 2 years old and about 250 to 350 kg at the start, fattened 3 to 6 months to 500 to 550 kg, sold using standard weighing and carcass grade (Thannithi et al.).

Before talking to a buyer, our farmer also checks the market. The Office of Agricultural Economics publishes the monthly national average price farmers receive for beef cattle, in baht per kilogram, on the government open data portal (OAE dataset). A national average is not your local price. Still, with a recent weight and a baht-per-kilo figure, you can do a rough sum before the buyer names a number, and ask how he set his price.

A mixed herd of white, brown and black Thai cattle sheltering under trees beside a pond
Photo: Christophe95, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Paper notebook or phone app?

Both work. A notebook costs almost nothing, never needs charging and is easy to show a buyer or an inspector. A phone app can draw the growth line for you and is harder to lose in the rain.

Digital tools exist, including from the government: the Department of Livestock Development's own e-Regist app is described in its store listing as a tool for farmers and officials to register, record and update farmer, farm and livestock data (DLD e-Regist, App Store). Private farm apps exist too. The Phayao paper sees good monitoring and recording systems, including ICT-based ones, as a future strategy for beef farms (Thannithi et al.).

My honest view: the best tool is the one you'll actually use every month. Start with paper if that's easier. If you move to an app later, your paper records are still the history.

End-of-season checklist

  • Every animal has an ID (tag or number) and its own page or record.
  • Birth or purchase date, sex and breed are written down.
  • Every vaccination and treatment has a date.
  • Every move on or off the farm is noted, with the licence when cattle go to another province.
  • Each animal has a weight for most months, taken the same way each time.
  • You've checked your tape against a real scale at least once, if you use one.
  • You noted any change in feed, and the date, so you can match it to the weights.
  • Before selling, you know the latest weight and the recent OAE price, and you've asked the buyer how he prices.
  • Records are stored somewhere safe, for at least 3 years.

None of this will make every sale a good one. But the next time someone sizes up your bull by eye, you'll have your own numbers too.

Sources

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